


Case 160: The Adventure Of The Blackened Knight (1899)

by Cerdic519



Series: Elementary 221B [206]
Category: Ivanhoe - All Media Types, Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Supernatural
Genre: 221B Baker Street, Alternate Universe - Detectives, Alternate Universe - Victorian, Bribery, Cock Rings, Destiel - Freeform, Gay Sex, Jealousy, Johnlock - Freeform, Justice, Large Cock, London, M/M, Panties, Prostitution, Servants, Teasing, Untold Cases of Sherlock Holmes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-04
Updated: 2019-02-04
Packaged: 2019-10-20 23:54:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17632166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerdic519/pseuds/Cerdic519
Summary: ֍ Why would a seemingly decent gentleman suddenly act so totally out of character? It is a quick return to the 'club scene' as Sherlock investigates a chivalric case where he finds someone who reaches parts that other men just cannot reach.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [I_kill_Zombies](https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_kill_Zombies/gifts).



_[Narration by Mr. Sherlock Holmes, Esquire]_

Most people in my life fell into one of two categories, namely the ones I wished to see and the ones I wished to see less frequently (which in the case of several family members was less than once per millennium if that!). But this case concerns one of the few people in that rare third category; someone whom it always a pleasure to see yet whom I did not wish to see if possible. Because like John whose patients tend to just stop demanding his services when they become well again, seeing the people in this last category rarely boded well for them.

It was now some six years since Mr. Harry Buckingham had, after various vicissitudes, succeeded his uncle Theobald as the new Lord Hawke. Lord Harry was married with six children and a seventh on the way, so when his card was presented that late February morning my heart was monetarily gripped with chill. He and his beleaguered family had surely had their full share and those of several other people when it came to bad luck.

Fortunately the gentleman, thirty-six at this time, looked happy enough when he was showed in which eased my concerns somewhat. We had last seen him some four years back when his unfortunate secretary Mr. Wainwright had done some drawings of him and Mrs. Wainwright had then transformed those into a frieze of the modern man about town - _sans apparel!_. And only days after that we had had to help his brother Henry when a friend of his son had been involved in what had turned out to be a most gruesome familial murder (The Adventure Of The Solitary Cyclist) which we had been unable to prevent although we had secured justice against the killer. 

Sometimes I did not wonder why my Mother so often asked about my cases 'for inspiration purposes'. I would have said that I doubted her capable of making up anything as bizarre as some of the things we came up against, but then I knew her.

“”I trust that your family is well?” I asked politely. I had been a little unnerved if truth be told that he had named his eldest son Tobias after the ill-starred nobleman of that name who, unbeknownst to the Adonis before us, had been his father. Lord Hawke smiled.

“Toby just came top of his class in school”, he said proudly, “Which annoyed Trelawney no end as he beat him by just one mark. And Alice is well again after her recent cough. No, I am here today on behalf of a friend who faces likely social ruin unless matters can be sorted.”

“We shall of course be delighted to assist”, I said. “Who is this person, pray?”

Lord Hawke sipped his drink before continuing. 

“I am as you know a member of just one London club”, he said. “Frankly I find the whole club scene horrendous but my late uncle insisted that I acquire membership of one of them for form's sake, and as it was also his old one I feel that I have to continue it in his memory. I suppose that it can be useful at times and it is they who have brought me here today.”

I could empathize with that as I too found the club scene frightful, full of far too many people who would never have been accepted into 'regular' society for all their manifold social failings. I knew many such as the Olympian Club, the scene of our recent adventure with Mr. Percy Jackson, to be little more than fronts for upper-class activity that bordered on the criminal. But as I have also said before, my own membership allowed John to have their 'illustrious' names on his calling-cards which in his profession was absolutely essential for some clients.

“The Round Table Club, as you might expect from the name, does everything with a Dark Ages theme”, our guest continued. “And one of the leading gentlemen of the club is a young fellow called Sir Wilfred Ivanhoe. I suppose I am showing my age by calling him a young buck as he is only twenty-five years old, barely a decade my junior, but I had always thought him straight as an arrow. Yet lately there have been all sorts of strange allegations against him. I do not know what to make of it so I decided that I should come and see you.”

I looked across at John in time to catch the inevitable pout. 

“I _do_ read more than just the social pages, you know!” he said testily.

I felt that that deserved a Level Three Judgemental Silence at the very least. He pouted some more; even our guest had to hide a smile.

“Will Ivanhoe is the third Sir Wilfred in succession”, I said. “His grandfather and father did not get on; the latter passed recently and the former revoked his title in favour of his grandson after a slight stroke, so the papers speculated brought on his partying too much at having outlived his son.”

The London papers were terrible at times, especially when they were so accurate.

“I see”, I said. “And if the young gentleman's name was held in bad odour, then the money that usually follows the title might descend elsewhere. Do you happen to know anything about the rest of the family perchance, Watson?”

It really was bad of our visitor to chuckle like that. I would have to have him round more often. John pouted again but answered as I had known he would.

“Will Ivanhoe's father was an only son but he had three sisters”, he said crossly. “One died; I do not know much about the other two.”

I just looked at him. He held out for an impressive seventeen seconds.

“Phyllis, the elder, married a bank manager called Mr. King”, he sighed. “I think they had two sons, possibly three. The younger daughter, Lily, eloped with an undesirable fellow called Mr. O'Callaghan from Ireland and went there; I believe that she was disinherited although presumably some sort of sum was settled on her. That is the usual way of these things.”

“Verily he is the social pages in action!” I teased turning back to our guest. “Can you tell me anything about the accusations levelled against the young gentleman, sir?”

“I think you would do better to talk to his valet, Arundel”, Lord Hawke said. “He knows a lot more about what has been going on whereas I have heard only rumour which, as we all know, can be unreliable. Few know a gentleman better than his valet, after all.”

Except possibly an artistic secretary, I thought wryly. And said secretary's good lady wife.

“I promise that I shall give this matter my full attention”, I said.

֍

“You think it that urgent?” John asked once our visitor had gone. “It is only a few rumours, surely?”

“Social disgrace helped to destroy Lord Hawke's illustrious father”, I said grimly. “I would rather not wait around to see if it destroys his friend as well!”

֍

Fortunately Lord Hawke had assured us that the valet had a half-day that very afternoon so we were able to decamp to the Temple. 

“Why the valet?” John wondered as we stood on the pavement outside Sir Wilfred Ivanhoe's house. “Gentlemen do not generally bother with the servants of other gentlemen. And why do we not go to the house and ask to see him?” 

“Because from what Lord Hawke said to us”, I said, “I suspect that at least some of the servants may be behind whatever troubles are affecting his friend.”

“I do not recall him saying anything about them”, John said.

“Exactly.”

He looked at me in frankly adorable confusion. If the matter had not been so pressing..... but definitely later. Especially when I saw those green eyes widen at the look that I was giving him. He knew full well what was coming soon, most likely him. Repeatedly if I had anything to say about it!

“Lord Hawke advised us to talk to just the valet, not all the servants”, I said, smiling at my beloved's suddenly rapid breathing and the fact that he had to covertly move his bag to his front. 

“You are mean!” he hissed.

“Maybe later”, I promised. “This looks like our quarry approaching.”

A nondescript young fellow was approaching from the house. He was below average height, had dark curly hair and wore spectacles. I would have called him quite unprepossessing had I not sensed a sudden tensing from nearby.

“What is it?” I asked as the fellow came up to where we were standing. He grinned at John.

“Hullo, doctor”, he said. “What are you doing round these parts?”

John seemed to suddenly find the pavement unusually fascinating. He coughed, blushed, then looked awkwardly at me.

“Sherlock”, he said, “meet Mr. Algernon Arundel. Also known as 'The Birthday Boy'.”

Oh, _this_ was going to be good!

֍

Fortunately the explanation was not the one that I might have feared, as Mr. Arundel worked at Mr. Godfreyson's molly-houses and had been attended by John on one occasion. Although I would later get some mileage out of why he had failed to mention that fact.

“I did not know that you worked as a valet”, John said, clearly still unsettled. The young fellow before us smiled. 

“We do not tend to advertise our 'day jobs', doctor”, he said, “if only to spare our employers potential embarrassment.”

That put a whole new light on our investigation, I thought.

“Are they aware of your 'side-work' at the house?” I asked. The valet smiled.

“My noble master knows very well 'firmly'”, he said, “and I am sure that some of the other servants suspect. There are few secrets downstairs as I am sure you know.”

“Are you off to the house now?” John asked. The young fellow shook his head.

“I have someone this evening but I have a spare few hours”, he said. “I was only headed to the library. How can I help you?”

“We wish to ask about certain events of late concerning your master”, I said. “Let us adjourn to a restaurant and we can talk.”

“We had better go to Peg's place then”, he said.

“Why?” I asked, He glanced sideways at John.

“It's the only one round here that serves pie!” he grinned.

Yes, the pout was still glorious!

֍


	2. Chapter 2

“There are two things I wish to ask you about”, I said, “so let us get the one you may not know so much about first. Do you know what happens to the family wealth should your master suffer social disgrace in the eyes of his grandfather?”

“I do know that”, Mr. Arundel said, “even though I suppose that I should not. The one member of the house that I would trust is Stewie – Ben, the steward – and Ivan recently asked him to work out how long each of us had been employed because he wanted to leave some of us some money in his will. I supposed that his grandfather's recent illness was behind that. I know he left only small amounts to his cousins who are a right ghastly bunch; more than one of them has been round on the scrounge. I think charities get the bulk of everything.”

I looked at him curiously.

“You call your master Ivan?” I asked.

“He has never struck me as a Wilfred, or even a Will”, Mr. Arundel smiled. “And as I said, he 'knows' me very firmly. Very firmly indeed!”

I smiled at the _innuendo_.

“Have any of the other servants said anything about that?” I asked.

“Not to Ivan or me”, he said, “although if they are not gossiping behind our backs them I'm a Dutchman!”

He sipped his coffee before continuing.

“You know how servants are in most houses, I'm sure sirs”, he said. “There's good and bad just like upstairs. But the atmosphere at Ivan's house has changed ever since these accusations began, and I'm sure some of them are in on it. Especially the butler Preston; he's a nasty piece of work and he has had more money as of late. Well, very briefly and then the local pubs have had it.”

“That is useful information”, I said. “I can probably find where he is getting his extra income from although I am sure that his benefactor has made at least some attempts at concealment.”

“I think it might have something to do with that stupid club he goes off to some days”, Mr. Arundel said. “Can't see the point of such things myself but where people have money there'll be those ready to part them from it. I suppose I shouldn't say that as I'm doing much the same with my body.”

“What can you tell us about these allegations?” I asked.

He thought for a moment.

“The odd thing is that it always involves servants saying they saw him doing something to one of their own”, he said at last. 

“What is odd about that?” John asked.

“Servants are a clannish lot”, Mr. Arundel explained. “We put up with a whole lot before we tell, yet somehow poor Ivan has run into a whole load of these accusations all of which ended up getting leaked to his club friends. I was thinking that maybe they want to force him out of the place, but why?”

“I considered that too”, I said, “but the Round Table does not have restrictive membership lists like some so he would not be preventing anyone else from gaining admittance. I also considered that they might be trying to unnerve your master for some reason. Without wishing to be indelicate, might such an attempt succeed?”

The valet frowned.

“I do not think so”, he said, “but I cannot be sure. And that worries me.”

It worried me too.

֍

We said goodbye to Mr. Arundel and adjourned to a nearby post office where I fired off several telegrams including one to the ever-efficient Miss Charlotta Bradbury. Then we returned to Baker Street to await developments. Sure enough a large folder was soon delivered from our clever and amazingly efficient friend and we spent much of the evening sifting through it and making notes. After a pleasant dinner we read some more and then went to bed.

Where, having worked John to a very impressive erection for someone of his advanced years, I affixed the unmovable cock-ring. His whimpering was heavenly but he had one or two questions to answer first before I would grant him release. He looked after me as I briefly left him and went over to our Special Drawer, then whined even louder when he realized that I was pulling out and preparing to don the frilly white panties. 

“Please!” he begged. “Killing me!”

“Some answers first”, I said as I donned the silken apparel. “Why is Mr. Arundel known as 'The Birthday Boy'?”

John arched his back but his bounds were too tight. He had a red paddle either side of his wrists and any move inwards would signal the end of the 'game', but he held out. For now.

“He only attends certain gentlemen on their birthdays at different houses”, he said.

I frowned. I knew how molly-houses operated what with my half-brother having owned several of them.

“Do not gentlemen prefer their regular 'friends'?” I asked.

He moaned again.

“Mr. Arundel suffers from abnormal curvature”, he managed.

I frowned again.

“His back looked perfectly straight to me”, I said.

John just looked at me, sheer lust in those almost black eyes.

“It is not his _spine_ that is curved!” he panted.

My eyes widened. Oh. _Ouch!_

“He reaches the parts that other men cannot reach”, John said. “Anyone fucked by him stays fucked; gentlemen usually have to go into another room and have time to recover. And he is part Italian, so..... we are talking twelve curved inches.”

That explained rather a lot, I thought. I felt almost sorry for young Sir Wilfred Ivanhoe who doubtless needed lots of rest periods himself. And not the least bit envious....

“Sherlock!”

Oh yes, John. I had nearly forgot. I grinned, reached over to grab his cock with one hand then flicked the lock on the cock-ring with the other.

“Come!” I said quietly.

And he did, juddering as if he was being electrified for what seemed like an age before falling back onto the bed. I would have worried but I was fairly sure that there was a smile on his face as I untied him.

“Any chance of that manly embracing thing?” he said hopefully.

“Ah”, I said. “You mean the cud....”

If looks could have killed.....

“You mean the manly embracing thing”, I said as I slid in beside him.

“Meanie!” he hissed as he folded himself into a.... a manly embrace.

I was sure that I could actually heat the pout!

֍

Fortunately the Round Table Club was one of those which allowed members to bring in guests so I arranged for Lord Hawke to bring us in at the next club meeting two weeks later. We were not of course allowed to address them but he was and could yield his time to me. 

I stood up and looked around the great and the good of the Round Table Club. I had seen better, but to be fair I had also seen much worse.

“I must thank Lord Hawke for being so generous in allowing me to talk to you today”, I said, noting that one of the members was already timing me to make sure that I did not get a second longer than I was entitled to. “I have to address the club on the matter of a recent scandal concerning someone on its membership list.”

An unpleasant-looking dark-haired fellow in his forties stood up. I could only assume that he had insulted his hairdresser prior to his last appointment. Grievously.

“What business is it of yours, sir?” he said snootily. “If Sir Wilfred Ivanhoe has behaved in such a manner then he is not fit to be a member of this place.”

“I shall be advising him to cancel his membership anyway”, I told him. “You, sir, I believe to be Mr. Jonathan King?”

He looked at me uncertainly.

“What if I am, _sir?”_ he sneered.

“Because it is the scandal surrounding your good self to which I was referring”, I said. 

I placed a folder of papers on the table in front of me. The fellow suddenly looked rather pale.

“These are details of the financial transactions between yourself and certain servants, mostly those at the house of Sir Wilfred Ivanhoe”, I said, relishing his sudden change in demeanour. “By some strange coincidence they are the exact same list of servants who have made scurrilous accusations against Sir Wilfred – and just days after each allegation was made, money was paid into their accounts by you.”

“You cannot prove that!” he said although I noted that some of the other club members were now looking askance at him.

“You tried to avoid detection by setting up a dummy bank account in the Isle of Man”, I said, “but the payments from you to that account and from it to the accusers tally perfectly. For your information Sir Wilfred has removed all three of the servants you used from his employment as of this morning. They were offered a simple choice; in return for a basic reference they could tell the truth about your misdeeds. They all chose so to do and have signed sworn statements to that effect.”

The club president, the fittingly named Mr. Arthur King stood up. I knew that he was a distant cousin of the man I had just accused of such skulduggery and wondered whose side he might be on.

“One question, Mr. Holmes”, he said looking pointedly at the member with the stopwatch who had clearly been about to pipe up. “Why? Why _should_ a club member behave in this way?”

“That was something I wondered about too”, I said. “In many of my investigations I have to ask that age-old question _cui bono?_ \- who benefits from a crime? In this case seemingly no-one benefited at all, unless it was someone who enjoyed seeing another man suffer – and sadly there are far too many of such people around these days.”

“Fortunately I was able to turn the villain's own tactics against him. He had used servants to blacken someone's name; I used them to find the truth. Two of your club servants talked; naturally I will not name them for doing something humanely decent, especially when one considers the subject of their revelation. Mr. Jonathan King wagered that he could destroy the reputation of a decent man because, and I quote, 'he did not like the fact that he was so popular'.”

I looked round the assembled members and fixed my gaze on one fellow, a leonine-haired giant of a man sat a few chairs away from my quarry. 

“Mr. Jonathan King's brother Richard”, I said. “Someone who was admired by people at the club until the much more handsome Sir Wilfred arrived on the scene. Someone who was jealous, and who saw that he could encourage that jealousy in his brother and fellow club member to the point where they could rid themselves of someone so undesirable. As I said, I shall be advising Sir Wilfred to resign from this institution forthwith. Good day _gentlemen_.”

֍

Lord Hawke came round later that same day and told us that the club had expelled the King brothers, and that he himself had joined Sir Wilfred in resigning from it despite their asking both gentlemen not to. I suppose that I should have been pleased that the club had done the right thing although I still felt it wrong that those men had committed a crime for which they could not be really punished.

Fortunately I had forgotten Miss Charlotta Bradbury. The _'Times'_ the next day featured a fascinating article on both gentlemen. Seriously, one would not have thought that to look at them – I mean, using vegetables in that way! - but it drove them both to quit England which was a better place without them.

I also received a gracious thank-you letter from young Sir Wilfred Ivanhoe, in which he promised that he would come round and thank me in person. His valet, who had written the letter for him, had rather crudely added, 'when he can walk again!'. Honestly, the young these days!

֍


End file.
